Current high power cw chemical lasers which use hypergolic gases require special equipment and special techniques for handling these highly reactive, corrosive, and toxic substances. In applications where these systems need to be portable, these substances are nearly prohibitive. For example, in the hydrogen fluorine (HF) chemical lasers gaseous F.sub.2 is usually used. These hypergolic gas problems also plague the high power supersonic chemical transfer laser. However, these lasers have been operated where the electrons in an electric arc have been used to heat a gas such as nitrogen (N.sub.2) and the hot N.sub.2 is used to produce fluorine (F) atoms by thermally dissociating a gas such as sulfur-hexafluoride (SF.sub.6) prior to mixing with hydrogen (H.sub.2) or deuterium (D.sub.2) to produce lasing by the reaction F+D.sub.2 .fwdarw.DF*+D where the DF* is produced in an excited vibrational state. While this approach solves the problem of using F.sub.2, it introduces the need for an electric arc and its associated generator and control equipment which can be large and heavy in addition to not being very efficient in the application. Also, when F.sub.2 is used it is first burned with a little H.sub.2 in the plenum to heat the mixture to a temperature where some of the extra F.sub.2 is thermally dissociated. This creates some HF which acts as a deactivator when the D.sub.2 is mixed in to produce the lasing. When the electric arc is used heating the mixture is no problem, but with the arc the amount of diluent like N.sub.2 is not easily varied for optimum laser operation.
High energy particles like electrons from the electrode space of flash X-ray machines have been used to operate high power chemical lasers in the pulsed mode by radiating mixtures such as F.sub.2 /H.sub.2 /O.sub.2,SF.sub.6 /H.sub.2,F.sub.2 /D.sub.2 /O.sub.2, SF.sub.6 /D.sub.2, and other mixtures. Neutron-sources like pulsed reactors have also been used to cause these mixtures to lase. High power chemical lasers can also be operated by introducing the proper mixtures into the cavity of conventional electron beam driven CO.sub.2 laser devices. However, in each of these cases very large and elaborate auxiliary power supplies are necessary. In some cases very high voltages are required.